


Crime and Devilment (or, Miscellaneous Drabbles & Ficlets)

by Grym



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Angst, Dan learning things he really didn't want to know, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Humor, Linda learning things about the netherworld, Lucifer whump, Reveal Fic, Romance, The Double Decker Drabble Fest, Trixie being adorable and a bit of a badass, Wings, piano of angst and despair, random collection of drabbles and ficlets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-18
Updated: 2017-09-24
Packaged: 2018-12-31 02:51:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 4,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12122934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grym/pseuds/Grym
Summary: Various minor glimpses into the life of the Devil and his friends. Here you'll find un-birthday surprises, mysterious knives, daring rescues, and the occasional concerned glance over the piano. Unrelated shortfics; each chapter stands alone. Tags and rating may change in time.





	1. Black Ops

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, lovely Lucifans. I'm trying to get myself back in the writing groove after a bit of a hiatus. Missing you all! 
> 
> At least for now, each of the teeny stories here were inspired by The Double Decker Drabble Fest, and either begins or ends with a given 5-word prompt. (Harder than it sounds, honestly!) As always, comments and kudos are my joy.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chloe Decker, detective and protector, slides through the shadows after her prey. (100-word drabble)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For [Antarctic Echoes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antarctic_Echoes).
> 
> The five-word prompt was "Chloe held up the knife." Classic 100-word drabble.

Chloe held up the knife, assessing. The blade’s edge caught the trail of moonlight from a nearby window, glinted with wicked sharpness. Satisfied, she slid into shadows and paused, listening for any sounds of movement around her.

Silence. Stillness.

Shrouded in darkness, the detective glided forward, each stealthy motion deliberate, measured, a well-trained stalk aimed for the single target she knew lay ahead. The knife was poised, steady in her grasp.

She ghosted along, barely breathing. Crept the final few feet. Raised the knife.

When it finally fell, a shrill, horrified voice cut through the air. “Mom! That’s _MY_ cake!”


	2. Knife Play

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What do you do when your nine-year old is found playing with knives? Just give in. (Silliness in 100-words.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For [Antarctic Echoes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antarctic_Echoes).
> 
> Another stab (hah) at the prompt "Chloe held up the knife." And another 100 words!

Chloe held up the knife, its wicked edges glinting. She scowled at her daughter’s wide-eyed, too-innocent face. “Where did you get this?”

“Where do you think?” came her roommate’s brash voice behind her. “It’s not like  _ you _ keep any decent blades. Even that torture wheel for pizza doesn’t cut.” 

“Maze,” Chloe warned. “Trixie’s _nine_.”

“I know! We should be up to two-handed flails by now.” Maze plucked the diabolical-looking instrument from Chloe’s fingers, tossing it carelessly toward the child before Chloe could react.

Trixie deftly snatched it from air with a toothy grin.

And Chloe stopped asking about the weapons.


	3. Un-birthdays, Holy Blades, and Other Benefits of Being the Devil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Lucifer blows out the candles, he'll need to cut the cake. But maybe not with that particular blade. Lucifer/Chloe established relationship.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For [Antarctic Echoes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antarctic_Echoes), again.
> 
> Same prompt. "Chloe held up the knife." Because there were more ideas. This one didn't stay a 100-word drabble. Hope it's worth the extra words. 
> 
> Post-season 2, canon!AU. Cheesy preliminary sexytimes. (Hey, AE! How about some implied "Naked Lucifer"? Just for you, my dear. ;-))

Chloe held up the knife she had found buried in the back of a penthouse kitchen drawer. “What about this one?” 

Lucifer turned, eyes widening when he saw the stark white blade in her grip. Damnation! He should have tossed the thing after Mum into another universe, after all. “Put that down, Detective,” he urged, holding up both hands in an effort to placate her before their entire evening ended in blood. Possibly his. “You probably don’t want to do whatever it is you’re thinking about just now. Or, at least, I hope not.”

She gave him a quizzical look. “I’m thinking this looks like it might cut that spectacularly huge birthday cake on your counter. The one I brought to celebrate your—” She paused, laughed and shrugged. ”—your ‘second un-birthday.’ Whatever that means.”

Head tilted, he peered at her, assessing the apparent lack of murderous urges. “You’re not feeling inexplicably angry?” he asked, edging toward her. “Vengeful? No hot rage or untoward arousal?”

“Nooo,” she answered slowly. She let him wrap his fingers carefully over hers and over the hilt of his Sister's blade before startling him by closing the distance between them suddenly. He flinched, but she didn't seem to notice, leaning instead against his chest and glancing up at him from beneath lowered lashes. He shivered as her warm breath brushed over the bare skin beneath his open robe. “ _ Should _ I find your weapon arousing?” she teased with a small sardonic eye roll. Her thigh pressed between his, a slow slide of delicious pressure.

“Detective,” he began, mouth suddenly dry with need. If this was his Detective trying to kill him, maybe it would be worth it?

“First, cut your cake,” she purred. The mundane phrase promised much more than birthday sweets, as did the fingers of her free hand toying with the belt of his bathrobe. “Then, maybe I’ll let you unwrap your other present.”

With an impatient growl, Lucifer pulled the sword from her hand and thrust it deep into layers of cake and icing. "There," he muttered and turned, sinful gleam in his dark eyes, to drag Chloe up into a hungry kiss.   


After several magnificent minutes, she finally gasped against his lips, "Okay, yeah. Cake later."

Neither of them noticed the thin twist of flame that licked Azrael’s blade behind them, nor saw the two blackened candles Chloe had haphazardly stuck atop the cake as they relit  with a quiet whoosh. The extinguished candles burned again with a pure white heat as, cake and blade alike forgotten, the Devil and the detective relocated the un-birthday celebration to his kitchen floor.


	4. Wings Are For Falling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lucifer's falling again, but this time he has company.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For [Skaoi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skaoi).
> 
> This was going to be a 100-word drabble. It isn’t.
> 
> At over 1500 words, it might deserve its own separate post. But it's also still just a quick slice of story, so I'm leaving it here for now. 
> 
> And yeah, I realize far too much happens in just a few seconds here--but I’ll argue that angels process faster than humans and that Trixie is … well, Trixie. ;-) The 5-word prompt was "Lucifer grabbed Trixie and flew." This started as a quick action adventure sequence, but transmogrified into whump and angst and a feathery reveal. Because everything I write in this fandom turns into a reveal story if I don't watch it closely enough. :P 
> 
> Somewhere, sometime after the end of season 2. AU at that point. And please don't miss the lovely piece of watercolor artwork the amazing [Antarctic_Echoes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antarctic_Echoes) created to go with this story at the end!

Lucifer grabbed Trixie and flew, unable to pause for explanations or comfort. Oblivious to her startled yelp, he swept her into the curve of his body and launched them both blindly toward the expanse of windows, the L.A. skyline, and the street fifty stories below. Thick glass exploded as they struck, the window's metal frame bending with a shriek. Twisting in midair to take the blow on one shoulder, he forced vast white wings back to life after months of just trying to ignore them. They responded only reluctantly, alien to him now, sluggish.

 _Too slow. Too slow_. 

As he and the child hit open sky, something tore through his trailing wing. It caught at the joint, arresting their plunge for a terrible fraction of a second. Pain flared hot and bright as forward momentum dragged them on. There was a hollow crack of bone and the sour tang of angelic blood in the air. Sucking in a breath, Lucifer found himself flooded with the spoor of the child’s fear—day-old drying sweat, the brine of furious tears—and the bite of accelerant that clung to her hair and hoodie.

Behind them, the building detonated into flame and thunder.

The Devil and the little girl plummeted in an uncontrolled tumble of feathers, shards of glass and steel, gusts of chemical smoke. Gouts of fire raced them toward the ground. A concussive heatwave buffeted them like the smiting Fist of his Father. Much as he had millennia ago in a very different Fall, Lucifer found himself straining against gravity and vertigo, fighting uselessly to slow his descent, wings clutching for air that burned away even as he careened through it.

 _Father!_ he snarled silently to the spinning sky, arms locked tight around his charge. _You stuck these bloody things on me again. You can damn well make them work!_

In that timeless stretch of seconds, a small, damp face pressed itself beneath his chin. Trixie's panting gasps were inaudible in the rush, but he could feel her ribs heaving against him. Her mouth moved at his collarbone in what he thought must be frightened gibberish until he caught a few murmured syllables before the wind ripped them away: “—ifer—Luc—Lucif—.”

A mantra, a prayer rising out of terror and faith, repeated as if it alone might protect her.

Redoubling his efforts, Lucifer flared his errant wings hard against their fall. This time, his feathers grappled with the air, billowing and snapping like a canopy in a hurricane. His out-of-practice muscles screamed in protest, and the cracked bone threatened to shatter, but Lucifer gritted his teeth and fixed his primordial will on the child in his arms, the woman who loved her, and his determination to spit in the eye of whatever threatened them, including his Father's machinations.

Below, police lights flashed in blues and reds. Emergency vehicles crowded the street. Without really thinking, he knew the Detective would be there among them, a lithe, determined form in the chaos. He imagined her demanding entry to the building where her child had been taken, conjured her gasp when explosions rocked the upper floors. Even now, he knew she would be shoving past her colleagues' restraining arms, stopped only when a monstrous figure of feather, fire, and smoke came crashing to earth from above her. Nightmare incarnate.

Maybe creating an angel-sized crater elsewhere in downtown L.A. would be preferable to the Detective—and the entire emergency response team—finally learning the horrible truth about the divine, about the Devil among them. Lucifer Morningstar. Bloodied, broken, scorched, and fallen.

Again.

But there was no time to choose a location, no options except for down and fast. Palm trees and cars and asphalt and gawping onlookers surged up to meet him. In a last mighty effort, Lucifer flung both wings wide, gave two huge, booming down-strokes, tucked the child even closer, and braced for impact.

They struck pavement hard, only just missing the bomb squad’s massive black RV and the antennas of a news crew’s van. Lucifer stumbled, skidded, and crashed to his knees, felt his wings slam against the vehicles on either side. He roared with agony as the damaged bone finally snapped, wing crumpled at a grotesque angle. Trapped, stunned, gasping for breath he shouldn’t even need, he barely felt the child loosen her grip and slide down to solid ground. In a moment, she was gone from him, leaving a strangely empty sensation against his shirt.

Lucifer let himself sink forward onto numb hands. He needed to move, to haul the broken and ungainly wings somehow into the ether before his colleagues saw, if they hadn’t already. Before the Detective realized, finally, why he kept dodging his promise to tell her everything, even after Linda, the desert, the tentative moments between them.

He tried to sit up, but the world swam sickeningly.

So, that was how the Detective found him—head down, shivering with nausea, streaked with blood and ash, and with his useless wings splayed around him in a horrible, disjointed tableau. 

He could hear her boots, the familiar stride pausing as she came around the front of the RV, the soft inhalation of her surprise. He waited, eyes shut against the coming storm.

Another few steps and then soft human fingers smoothed over his disheveled hair, cupped his cheek. “Oh, my God—” Chloe breathed. “I mean, oh, sorry—I didn't mean—." When he looked up at her in blinking confusion, she huffed softly and tried again. “Lucifer, thank you," she said simply, earnestly.  "Just  . . . thank you. _”_

He met her pale, honest eyes, barely noticing the other figures gathering behind her, and frowned. “Detective—?”

Pigtails flying, Trixie raced back out of the dim crowd to fling her small arms around his neck and nearly drag him to the ground. “She said ‘thank you’, silly! You're supposed to say 'You're welcome!'” The spawn hugged him with an exuberance just shy of aggression, and he struggled weakly for balance and space, missing whatever else she was babbling beneath the stab of pain in his jostled wing.

Chloe caught her daughter and pulled her away, laughing quietly. “Careful, monkey.”

"Lucifer has wings!" the child told her mother, practically vibrating with excitement. Then, to Lucifer, “You have _wings!_ You can _fly!"_ as though he had never noticed before. She leaned in and whispered loudly in his ear before he could flinch away. "You're my fairy godmother. But don't worry; I won't tell."

Lucifer met the Detective's eyes helplessly, started to shrug, but stopped himself before he shifted the wing again. He settled for an indignant sniff.

When the (clearly confused) spawn vanished again into the crowd of trousered legs and work boots and distant murmuring voices, Chloe touched the back of his hand gently to get his attention. “Lucifer, why didn’t you tell me?”

He wanted to pull away from her fingers, wanted to catch them in his and never let go. But he only sat still, too weary to choose. “I never lied to you, Detective. I—I was trying to find the right way to say it. Shockingly, there's never exactly a good time to prove to someone you're the Prince of Darkness.”

“No, not that,” she interrupted, shaking her head.

“What? About the wings? I supposed if you ever genuinely accepted I was the Devil, those would likely sort themselves.”

“No,” she insisted. “Lucifer, why didn’t you tell me you were going after Trixie? You could’ve been killed.”

He stared at her in stunned silence.

“I get it,” she continued. “I do. But surely you know I’ve had plenty of time to come to terms with who you are? With whatever you are? I don’t care if you’re a crazy lunatic, or a walking coincidence, or something else entirely. I told you I needed the eggs, right?” A sudden smile split her face. “But—uh—maybe ‘eggs’ was a bit too on the nose for you.” She flicked a loose feather off his knee.

“I’m the Devil, not a chicken,” he grumbled. With her assistance, he slowly pushed himself to his feet, unsure whether his shakiness was from the shock of falling or the Detective’s unexpected acceptance of all that she’d seen.

“So you say,” she replied agreeably, sliding her arm through his to steady him.

Trixie reappeared to bounce up and down in front of them, apparently the delight of discovering her "fairy godmother" outweighing the trauma of the rest of the day. “Mommy, I got to go flying with Lucifer!” she sang. Ducking beneath Lucifer's bedraggled wing, she tugged at his sleeve. “Can we do it again soon? Will you fly me to school? Please? Lucifer, pleeeze?”

Standing still for a moment, Lucifer looked at his Detective and the unlikely child, then around at the stunned expressions of the gathered emergency response crew. The EMTs had frozen at the door of their ambulance, gurney and equipment forgotten. A uniformed officer he thought was named Mike had pulled his gun but left it dangling at his side. Daniel gaped openly, rather like he did at the empty pudding cups Lucifer sometimes still left on his desk. Ms. Lopez had both hands pressed over her mouth, but her eyes were alive with unusually silent delight.

He shook out his wings a little, brushed a clump of ash from his rumpled shirt, lifted his chin. Broken, bloodied, and fallen, he might be. But maybe wings were made for falling, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And, OMG, the amazingly talented [Antarctic_Echoes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antarctic_Echoes) painted this stunning glimpse of Lucifer and Chloe at the end. I am overawed and honored and just had to share! Don't miss her fiction here on Ao3 and, in time I hope, some other amazing watercolor work on Tumblr.  
> 


	5. Questions Better Left Unanswered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eventually, someone at the precinct is going to look at CCTV of Lucifer's peculiar criminal captures. And, of course, it would just have to be Dan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For [Mia_Vaan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mia_Vaan).
> 
> Another drabble for the fest, prompted by Mia. Prompt for first or last line was "The security footage was enlightening." Set sometime after 2.13 “A Good Day to Die" and referencing to the capture of Burt, the poison smuggler in a previous episode. Because Chloe can't be the only colleague who's curious occasionally . . .

The security footage was enlightening. During Chloe’s illness, Dan had almost forgotten he’d requested CCTV footage from the sting. But after the impossible cure and Lucifer’s disappearance, he suddenly recalled holding that fallen gun in his hands and the imprint of fingers on the twisted barrel.

Now he stared wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the computer screen on his desk, watching again as Lucifer strode forward and reached for the gun, teeth bared, eyes flashing with unearthly fire. He didn’t need to see the smuggler’s face to know that backward scramble was pure panic.

He was sure he shared the expression.


	6. Good Intentions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We've all heard the saying. Dr. Linda more than most of us.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For [theleafpile](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theleafpile).
> 
> Yet another drabble--a double drabble (200 words) this time because it was too much fun to detail this. For the awesome prompter who suggested "That's the Road to Hell" as a starting (or ending) point. Set sometime after Linda learns and accepts the truth of her Celestial friends. Apologies for politics, but the show has already established their stance on the topic, so I’ll argue alignment with canon. ;-) Story concept from darling hubby, Kamots, who is much cleverer than I am!

“That’s the Road to Hell?” Linda peered past Mazikeen and down an alley she didn’t remember seeing before. Unusually broad for one of the oldest commercial districts, it shimmered with midday heat and bustled with people. A medicinal marijuana sign flashed desultorily across from the “Church of the New Wave” with its garish neon crosses that looked vaguely like surf boards. She was pretty sure she saw a Starbucks logo and a seasonal Pumpkin Spice Mocha Overload flyer stapled over the litter of a nearby public message post.

Looking down at the street itself, the psychiatrist noted a pattern of odd, hexagonal pavers, each puzzle-pieced together as far as she could see. Curious, she edged forward. The paver closest to her toes had an inscription like the stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. “Thalidomide,” she read aloud. “Huh.” 

She glanced back at Maze, who shrugged and folded her arms, disinterested.

Linda leaned further. Just beyond the first, another was inscribed “Agent Orange.” Stepping gingerly on one that said “Just One Donut,” she thought she could make out a newer stone, edges unworn, inscription fresh: “Make America Great Again.”

“Wait.” Linda turned, wide-eyed, to her demon friend. “It’s actually  **_literal_ ** ?!”


	7. Rhapsody

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes, music isn’t the Devil’s comfort.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the inspirational [titC](https://archiveofourown.org/users/titC). She of The Hopeful Gloom(tm).
> 
> Another 1,500+ word drabble-out-of-control, inspired by titC’s 5-word prompt, “Is this the real life . . .?” Takes place in an amorphous (perhaps even nonexistent) fanwriter’s timeline somewhere after 2.07 “My Little Monkey," but responds mostly to events in 2.06 “Monster.” And if you need a refresher for song that runs through this little fic, have a listen to the official music video [on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJ9rUzIMcZQ).
> 
> According to the online Cambridge Dictionary, a rhapsody is “a piece of music written without a formal structure that expresses powerful feelings . . .” 
> 
> Cue the angst. And the comfort.

_Is this the real life . . ?_ Lucifer’s long fingers roved restlessly over the piano keys, coaxing the strains of Queen’s piecemeal melody from the instrument. _Is this just fantasy?_

Dark and still, Lux was deserted in the early hours of morning. The staff had gone home long ago, having cleared the detritus of the weekend’s revels and doused the nightclub’s many lights. At his request, they had left only the decorative fireplace beneath the deejay booth burning, its gaslight flames flickering sullenly in the shadows. The faint glow followed the curve of the piano’s surface, crept into facets of the crystal ashtray, and tinted the trail of cigarette smoke that hung in the air.

Lucifer played haltingly. _Caught in a landslide, no escape from reality._

The rectangle of fire had been a late addition to the nightclub’s decor, a subtle suggestion of descent into an underworld of demons and damnation—a road to Hell metaphor suitable for this elegant pit of L.A. debauchery. Escape from reality? He knew the imitation fire was about as real as the painfields of Tartarus to his drunken patrons. Indeed, they came here to escape into a bottle or some bodies, to wrap the thrumming darkness around themselves and never realize that their antics were overseen by the actual Devil himself.

As it turns out, that Devil was as real and destructive as he had always been painted. As real as a dead and buried brother, celestial immortality snuffed in an instant of desperation. As real as his catatonic therapist, who asked for something she didn’t—couldn’t—understand.  As real as the torture of millions of souls, their cries echoing in that ash-choked labyrinth he had tried so hard to abandon.

He found the right notes. _I need no sympathy._ Sympathy for the Devil was another song entirely, undeserved, misapplied, a lie to end all lies.

Even as he tried to swallowed that bitter truth, Lucifer's traitorous mind called up how he'd felt when the Detective questioned his determination to stand before the sniper's rifle, her seemingly painful suggestion that he should talk to someone, anyone. He remembered the warm sandwiches and her mystifying, tearful hug when he spoke of her father. They had stood in her kitchen, his arms tentatively around her and her cheek pressed against his shirt, the smell of sleep in her hair a strange palliative for his own tumultuous emotions.

Lucifer sighed. Even in the near perfect dark, the lacquered fallboard of the Steinway reflected the movement of his hands as he played another few bars. _I’m easy come, easy go, little high, little low . . ._

His fingers stuttered on the minor keys, and he stopped playing to reach for his smouldering cigarette and suck in the bitter smoke. As he exhaled, he contemplated the line of untouched shot glasses on the piano and, not for the first time, wished the booze and drugs could reach whatever it was that had claimed residence inside his chest and belly, that fist of hollowness that clenched inside him lately whenever he found himself alone and thinking.

Grimacing, he tossed back the first of many shots when a familiar voice spoke from the stairs.

“Do you usually hang out here alone in the dark?”

He glanced back, his preternatural gaze easily picking out the form of Chloe Decker as she made her way cautiously down to the main floor.

“Not alone usually, no,” he said, trying for a lightness he didn’t feel. His fingers crawled across the keys once more. _Doesn’t really matter to me, to me . . ._

“ _Bohemian Rhapsody,_ right?” the Detective asked as she approached. “You get many requests for that these days?

He tapped out several sharp, demanding notes _—Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me_. “Unlike you, Detective, some of my regular clientele actually like to believe they’re dancing and drinking with the Devil. So, it seems a little appropriate, don’t you think?”

Eyes still apparently adjusting in the poor light, Chloe found him first with fingers that ghosted across his shoulders until she could settle herself comfortably beside him on the piano bench. “Depends,” she answered, once seated. “I always thought that song was sort of about redemption—or, at least, about coming to terms with things that can’t be changed.”

Lucifer stared down at her, considering. “You would, wouldn’t you?” he said quietly.

“Why? What do _you_ think it’s about?” She blinked in the smoke from his dying cigarette, trying to focus on his features in the dark. “Wait. Don’t tell me. You made a deal with Freddie Mercury down in the underworld and got him to reveal the truth?” she teased.

“Mmmm.” He stubbed the cigarette out, peered at her in the club’s orange-hazed shadows. Wondered briefly what, if anything, she was seeing when she turned toward him that way. “Would you believe me if I said I helped write it?”

“No.” Her wry chuckle reminded him with a pang just how true that was, her persistent disbelief. When he didn’t respond, she pressed on. “Well? Do you have a different interpretation or not?”

Lucifer spidered the fingers of one hand over several keys again, drawing out more familiar notes from the ballad. “It’s a Faustian bargain,” he said finally over the simple, chordless melody. “Do you know the legend of Faust, Detective?”

“He sells his soul to the devil, right?”

“And, in time, suffers the price. Yes.” _We will not let you go! (Let me go!)_ The single-finger notes pealing from the instrument were strident but fragmentary, too small and thin for the large space. “I think it’s a song about a soul who murders in full knowledge of his actions. And in doing so, he throws away everything that might matter to him. Forever.” Lucifer shivered, swallowing hard against the sudden desert in his throat. After a moment, he grated, “It’s not about redemption, Detective. It’s about forgiveness that will never, ever come.”

He let his hands slide abruptly from the keys and drop into fists against his thighs, the last discordant notes lingering in the air with the smoke. He could feel her gaze, the weight of it like the phantom heft of his severed wings, familiar, unwanted, a memory of freedom and of pain.

When she didn’t speak, he found he couldn’t bear the silence. “Why are you here, Detective? A bit early for a professional call, isn’t it?” His grin felt forced. “Or a bit late for a social one. But, then, I'm always game for—”

Her fingers brushed his, stilling them in his lap before he knew they were fidgeting. “Don’t,” she said. “You don’t have to do that, Lucifer. Not with me.”

“Do what, Detective?” he asked weakly, grateful she probably couldn’t see him very well, backlit by the false fire, enmeshed in the all-consuming dark.

She ignored his question. “Lucifer, I know something’s going on with you. There has been for days. And I know you aren’t going to tell me because you think I won’t understand.” A breath. Her hand slipped up along his forearm and stopped, firm and sure, at the rolled cuff of his shirt, as though she thought he might bolt. “And maybe I _won’t_ understand. I get that. I do. But that doesn’t mean that I’m not concerned about you.”

His voice sounded distant in his own ears. “Are you—checking up on me, Detective?” He frowned down at her hand. The firelogs sparked noiselessly above them.

She nodded. “Is that okay?”

He wasn’t entirely sure, to be honest.

“I told you,” she continued, “that’s what partners—and friends—do for each other.” She patted his arm. “You were there for me with my Dad’s killer. Let me do the same. Whatever it is that's bothering you.”

The fire’s nonexistent warmth seemed to have stolen impossibly across the room, or perhaps it radiated out from where the Detective’s touch lingered, warm and confident, against his sleeve. Her thumb traced back and forth idly, raising the hair on his arm and at the nape of his neck, a frisson of something that wasn’t sensual, exactly, and which triggered an unexpected rush of gratefulness he really didn’t understand.

Turning back to the piano, Lucifer huffed noncommittally and began to play once again, the quiet rolling chords of the song giving voice to those things he had done, those things that he couldn’t explain and wasn’t ready for her to see. Without meaning to, he channeled those emotions he wished he couldn't feel—guilt, grief, hopelessness, isolation, loss—into his hands. _Carry on, carry on as if nothing really matters._

The music trembled in the air.

As he played, he Detective’s hand didn’t leave his arm, light enough to allow him to stretch over the piano keys and move with the changing rhythms of the rhapsody. Her shoulder bumped his occasionally as if to remind him of her presence in the dark. And when the last wistful notes faded away, she leaned against him and simply breathed for several minutes.

He thought she had perhaps fallen asleep when she finally spoke. “It matters to me,” she said simply.

“What does?”

“Whether you live or die. Whether you can find whatever absolution you seem to need.”

“Detective—”

“It matters whether you trust me enough to let me help you. I—I know you have a therapist." Before he could interrupt to say that he wasn't sure about that anymore, she continued, her voice as firm and sure as her touch. "And you also have me, Lucifer. I just need to know that you know that, okay?”

“I know, Detective,” he said solemnly. “I do know.” And, as he turned on the bench to press a chaste kiss to her hair, he realized—to his own surprise and relief—that he did.


End file.
